Goodvine v. Swiekatowski et al

Filing 38

ORDER granting in part and denying in part 33 MOTION to Compel by Plaintiff Christopher Goodvine. Signed by Chief Judge Barbara B. Crabb on 8/5/2009. (arw),(ps)

IN THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FO R THE WESTERN DISTRICT OF WISCONSIN --------------------------------------------CHRISTOPHER GOODVINE, P la i n t i f f , v. ORDER 0 8 - cv -7 0 2 - b b c

W ILL IAM SWIEKATOWSKI, S A R A H COOPER, CHAPLAIN M. D O N O V A N , DENNIS MOSHER, W A R D EN POLLARD, PETER ERICKSEN, M IC H A E L MOHR, TOM GOZINSKE, R IC K RAEMISCH, JOHN BETT, D A N WESTFIELD, MATTHEW FRANK, T IM O T H Y LUNDQUIST and DEPARTMENT OF C O R R E C T IO N S , D efendan ts. --------------------------------------------T his case is proceeding on plaintiff Christopher Goodvine's claims that defendants violated his rights under the Constitution and the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Person s Act in various ways. Now before the court is plaintiff Christopher Goodvine's seco n d motion to compel defendants to respond to a number of his discovery requests and h is request for sanctions. Dkt. #33. For the reasons discussed below, I am granting

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p lain tiff's motion to compel defendants to answer his second set of interrogatories, nos. 1-4, b ut I am denying plaintiff's motion to compel responses to his requests for admission and pro duction of documents and his motion to sanction defendants.

A. Interrogatories In his second set of interrogatories, plaintiff asks defendants to state whether other altern atives were considered before imposition of the one soft cover religious text policy of D O C 309 IMP 6A (Interrogatory No. 1). Interrogatories Nos. 2-4 also ask about the im plem entation of the procedure. Defendants respond that, because they had no personal invo lvem ent in the drafting of the procedure, they do not know whether other alternatives w ere considered. However, as plaintiff points out, he was allowed to proceed against the W isco n sin Department of Corrections and these interrogatories concern a relevant d ep artm en t procedure. Therefore, I will compel defendants to respond to plaintiff's second set of interrogatories, nos. 1-4, as they concern DOC 309 IMP 6A and the Addendum, "R e ligio us Property Chart" dated April 2007.

B . Requests For Admission P lain tiff's motion to compel will be denied with respect to his requests for admission. T h ere is some confusion in Request #3 as to the time frame of the request. Defendant 2

D o n o v an has agreed to supplement his response to this request with the corrected date of 20 08 . In requests 5,6 and 7 plaintiff asks defendant Donovan to admit that he provided c e r tain religious items to certain inmates. Donovan responds that he does not remember w hether he provided these items and he does not maintain records showing what he does an d does not provide. Plaintiff cannot force Donovan to admit something he does not kn ow . If plaintiff believes that the prisoners he names in his requests would have a better recollection , he is free to ask those prisoners to provide a truthful declaration. In request for admission no. 9, plaintiff asks defendants Westfield, Bett, Frank and R a em isch to admit that they were aware of the Internal Management Policies prohibiting priso ners in segregation from having more than one soft-covered religious text. Defendants object on the ground that the meaning of "Internal Management Policies" is not clear. H ow ever, they agree to supplement their response with plaintiff's clarification that he is referrin g to DOC 309 IMP 6A and the Addendum. Thus, plaintiff's motion to compel a response to that admission will be denied as unnecessary.

C. Requests For Production of Documents In his second request for production of documents, plaintiff requests defendants to pro duce a copy of all inmate complaints he submitted concerning the claims in this lawsuit. (Request No. 3). Defendants object to this request on the ground that it is vague. However, 3

they agree to "produce any inmate complaint Goodvine identifies from his Inmate C om plaint History Report within 2 working days after he informs Cathy Francois with this info rm ation ." That report was to provided to plaintiff as part of defendants' response to his m otio n to compel. Accordingly, his motion to compel production of the inmate complaints w ill be denied without prejudice to allow him to take advantage of defendant's proposal. Plaintiff also asks defendants to produce correspondence logs maintained by defendan t Pollard and Michael Baenen. (Request No. 4). As plaintiff concedes, Pollard's correspo nd ence log has been provided to him for inspection and copying. Defendants represent that no correspondence log for Baenen exists. Because plaintiff has been provided th e documents for inspection and copying that exist, his motion to compel the production of documents will be denied as moot.

D . Request for Sanctions Plaintiff requests sanctions because defendants failed to comply with Magistrate Judge S tephen Crocker's June 18, 2009 order. In that order, the magistrate judge directed

defendants to allow plaintiff to inspect and copy four specific religious texts and to provide h im with the list of books currently in the library by July 6. Defendants provided the list of books to plaintiff several days late, but plaintiff has not shown he was prejudiced by that d e la y . 4

W ith respect to the religious texts, defendants concede that they not have not yet pro duced those to plaintiff for inspection and copying. They must do so now. In the future, if defendants are unable to comply with a court-imposed discovery deadline, they should seek an extension of time from the court rather than wait for plaintiff to file a motion to co m p e l.

OR DER IT IS ORDERED that: (1 ) Plaintiff's motion to compel defendants to respond to interrogatories nos. 1-4 of his second set of interrogatories is GRANTED. (2) Plaintiff's motion to compel defendants to respond to plaintiff's second requests fo r admissions (nos. 3, 5, 6, and 7) is DENIED. (3) Plaintiff's motion to compel his second request for production of documents (Nos. 3 and 4) is DENIED as moot. (4) Plaintiff's request for sanctions is DENIED. Defendants may have until August 12 , 2009 to produce for plaintiff's inspection and copying the following books: The Reliance of Traveler -A Classical Manual of Sacred Law; Invocations of the Shadhili Order; The

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S hadh ili Tariqah and Hisnul Hasin E n tered this 5 t h day of August, 2009. B Y THE COURT: /s/ B AR B AR A B. CRABB D istrict Judge

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